Changing Scene

Hundreds of Schneider Electric customers, industrial automation experts, industry partners, technology experts, and executives will converge at its annual EcoStruxure Foxboro user group conference on August 6-9 in San Antonio, Texas.The comprehensive three-day conference program includes more than 50 user-driven industry sessions, technical application workshops and accredited training courses. Each session is designed specifically for customers and partners to share their expertise across the company’s broad set of EcoStruxure Foxboro process automation solutions and offers.

Participants will address critical industry challenges and discuss the future of process automation, including the impact of digitization in the age of IIoT. Over the course of the event, attendees will learn how to drive measurable real-time profitability improvements, safely. Attendees will explore Schneider Electric’s unique, value-focused approach to controlling real-time business variables, which converts process control and automation systems into industrial profit engines.

“We are living in exciting times for our industry—we’ve never had as much capability as we do now,” says Ted Johnson, DCS principal, Southern Company and chair of Schneider Electric’s customer-driven Foxboro Steering Committee. “With all this technology at our disposal, it’s sometimes hard to know how to maximize its full value. Schneider Electric’s annual Foxboro user group conference allows us to collaborate, explore best practices and experience the modern technologies and models that we can bring directly back to our plants. We always go back to work with better ideas for applying new capabilities safely and securely so we can overcome our critical business challenges and increase profitability.”

“Foxboro User Group attendees will learn how to lay a course for success in the age of digitization,” said Peter Martin, vice president, Innovation and Marketing, Process Automation, Schneider Electric. “We understand and are creating the future of process automation. At this conference and in their enterprises around the world, we are helping our customers apply the power of real-time control to industrial variables, such as safety, profitability, environment, reliability and security, to help them convert their process automation investments into the profit engines of their business.”

EcoStruxure is Schneider Electric’s open, interoperable, IoT-enabled system architecture and platform, leveraging advancements in IoT, mobility, sensing, cloud, analytics, and cybersecurity. EcoStruxure has been deployed in 480,000+ sites, with the support of 20,000+ system integrators and developers, connecting over 1.6 million assets under management through 40+ digital services.

On a regular basis, our publications profile members of our industry through their responses to a Q&A. It’s a way of recognizing industry movers and shakers, and helping our readers get to know them better.

Recently we launched an initiative with Electro-Federation Canada's Young Professionals Network to include profiles of up-and-coming leaders. We provided the list of questions below to Taylor Gerrie, Automation Account Specialist at Gerrie Electric Wholesale Ltd. in Burlington, Ontario. Here are Taylor’s responses.

First and foremost, sitting down with Susan Uthayakumar feels more like sitting down and conversing with a friend than conducting an interview with the Canadian president of one of the world’s largest electrical manufacturers. Of course, she exudes the confidence and knowledge her position demands, but equally identifiable are an open and engaging nature.

In a recent sit-down, we learned a little about Susan’s history and what drives her to succeed.

To begin, Susan was born in Sri Lanka and immigrated to Canada at a young age. She went to high school in Canada and attended the University of Waterloo where she earned undergraduate and graduate degrees.

Upon completing university Susan began her working career with Deloitte, which she describes as a great starting point as she was surrounded by highly driven and intelligent individuals. She welcomed being in a position that was demanding and helped nurture a strong work ethic. Her work with Deloitte also instilled a great interest in acquisitions, which would serve her well as her career unfolded.

We often learn how to look forward by first looking back, or at the very least we realize that despite our best efforts we have not truly advanced quite so much as we had thought. Sure, technology is rapidly advancing. That’s beyond question. But what about our approach to selling it? Have we changed that much in the last 20, 40, 60 years? Inevitably there have been advances and changes in marketing, the Internet causing the biggest shift, but many of the concerns and directives that have driven the distribution and marketing of industrial electrical products remain, or at least planted the roots of the concerns of manufacturers and distributors today.

To gain perspective of the perceptions and directions of electrical product distribution in 1960, we turn to Edwin H. Lewis. In 1960 Lewis published “The Distribution of Industrial Electrical Products” in the Journal of Marketing.

To fully define electrical product distribution in 1960, Lewis broke his study into several categories. We will follow his direction and provide his insights on the industry in each of the categories he identified.

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